Lyon County times. [volume] (Silver City, Nev.) 1874-1907, 1887-11-05

left with her fas fists, Abe on with you.
every one Ican't have this noise going or
here. Come, Off you all go. and got tie
horses into the stable; they will be right away
by morning il you trust them to the Kafirs.-
The woman, to Johns astonishmenf ai"i
relief, literally bundled the whole tribe of
them out of the front door.
aNow then, rooibaatje," said the old lady,
brisltiy, when they had gone. ~ like you be.
cause you arc a bravo man. and were not
afraid when they moobed you. Also. l don't
want to have mess male upon my Goor
here. or any noiso or shooting II those men
cone back and flnd you here they will first
get rather drunker and then kill You. SO You
had better be of wlIile you get the chance"
and she pointed to the door,
II really ana much ef1fGnl ~ yen, my
aunt, ," said John, utterly astouisi,ed.
aOh, as to that" she said dryly, ut would
De great pity to kill the last English roof.
baatje in the whole British army; they ought
10 keep you as a curiosity. Here, take a tot
OF brandy before you 60, it is a wet night,
and sometimes when you are clear Of the
Transvaal and remember this business, re-
member, too, that you owe your life to Tanta
';oo,zee. But would not have saved y01,
not /, II you had not been so plucky. like
. man to be man. There, be off"
John poured out and gulped down half
tumblerful of the brandy, and in another mo-
ment was outside the house and had slipped
of into the night. It was very dark and
wet, for the rain clouds had covered up the
moon, and he soon realized that any attempt
to look for his horse would only end in failure
snd in his recapture also The only thing to
90 fnca inn
of Moofontein as quickly as he could; so of
he went down the track across the veldt as
hard as his stiff legs would take him. He
had a ten miles trudge before him, and with
that cheerful acquiescence in circumstances
over which he had no control which was one
of his characteristics, he set to work to make
the best of it. For the first hour or so all
went well, and then to his intense disgust he
discovered that he was of the track. a fact
at which anybody who has ever had the
pleasure on dark night Of wandering along
d so called road on the African veldt will
scarcely be surprised. After wasting quar-
ter of an hour or more in q vain attempt to
find the path he struck out boldly for a dark
looking mass that loomed in the distance,
and which he took to be Mooifontein bill.
And SO it was, only instead of keeping to the
left, when he would have landed up at the
house, or rather where the house had
stood, he unwittingly bore to the right,
and thus went half round the bill be-
fore he found out his mistake. Nor would
he have found it out then had he not
chanced in the mist and darkness to turn
into the mouth Of the great gorge known as
Leuw kloof, where he had once, months be-
fore, had an interesting talk with jess just
before she went to Pretoria. 1t was while be
was laundering and stumbling up this gorge
that at length the rain ceased and the moon
got out, it being then nearly midnight Its
very first rays lit upon one OF the extraordi-
nary pillars of balanced powders, and by it
he recognized the locality. As may be imag-
iued, strong man as he was, John was by this
time quite exhausted. For nearly a week he
had been travelling incessantly, and for the
last two nights he had not only not slept, but
had endured a great deal of peril and mental
excitement. Had it not been for the brandy
Tanta Coetzee had given him he could not
have got over the fifteen miles or so ofground
he had covered, and now he was quite broken
down. and felt that the only thing that he
could do, wet through as he was, would be to
lie down somewhere and sleep Or die as the
case might be. Then it was that the little
cave near tho top Of the kloof, the same from
which Jess had watched the thunderstorm,
came into his recollection. He had been there
once with Bessie after their engagement, and
she had told him that it was one Of Jess IA
vorite spots
If he could once reach the cave he would at
any rate get shelter AMI a dry place to lie on.
Il could not be moro than 800 yards away.
So he struggled on bravely through the wet
grass and over the scattered powders, until
AZ last ha can,e to ho base of the htlrc column
that had been shattered by the lightning be-
fore Jess eyes.
Thirty PAGES moro and he was in the cave.
With a sigh Of utter exhau 'rIon he flung
himself down upon the rocky floor ami was
almost instantly buried in a profound sleep.